On Thursday night, Widespread Panic kicked off its first run at Ascend Amphitheater in Nashville, TN in seven years with help from local native guitarist Daniel Donato. The clouds and heavy downpour that had lingered over Nashville for the past few days cleared up within an hour of Widespread Panic’s first set if the weekend, letting fans bask in the sunshine along the Cumberland River.
An appreciative roar rippled through the crowd as members of Widespread Panic retook their positions onstage. With a special guest sit-in, a backwards hat-wearing John Bell, and a double-dose of Warren Zevon encore tunes, the first night set the bar high for the weekend ahead.
JB blessed the audience with a “Good evenin’ Nashville” before opening the floodgates with a deluge of old-school classics. A raucous rendition of Van Morrison’s “Send Your Mind” cracked into the savory sweetness of “Coconuts”. Without waiting, Jimmy Herring joined Duane Trucks and Sunny Ortiz’s rhythms to introduce “Porch Song” before easing into the progressive, instrumental “Party At Your Mama’s House”.
Jimmy Herring ran unbridled, favoring his tiger-striped PRS for almost the entire night, until Dave Schools merged into the down-low, dirty blues of Robert Johnson’s “Stop Breaking Down”. JB channeled the power of his backwards cap for an extra saucy performance and dipped his toes into a Hound Dog Taylor-inspired “Gimme Back My Wig” rap.
After pausing to let the audience and amplifiers cool off, the rolling drums set the stage for a soaring “Surprise Valley” sandwich. The rowdy crowd accompanied JB for the first verse before the musicians went where few could follow, into the sprawling depths of an improvised clavinet-heavy jam. Near midway through the song, JoJo Hermann slid over to his piano as the esoteric introduction to The Guess Who’s “No Sugar Tonight / New Mother Nature” reverberated into the surrounding neighborhood of downtown Nashville. JoJo then switched positions once again to dish out an organ-filled return to the back half of “Surprise Valley”. Closing the first frame with an evolutionary “Conrad”, the crowd’s “thousand little legs” wiggled in sync with the titular animal until finding respite amidst the eminent cocoon of set break.
Refreshed and ready, JoJo’s piano and Duane’s snare excavated “Big Wooly Mammoth” for a prehistoric romp until JB rolled up his sleeves to capture lightning in a bottle during “Hatfield”. Naturally, the rain—which had stopped before the show began—started to drizzle as JB honored the legendary rainmaker. The imaginative frontman kicked his spurs into another whimsical rap here that added new colors to the existing portrait of Hatfield’s mama and cold beers on hot summer days.
The opening and closing tracks off the band’s 2024 release Snake Oil King flowed in succession as “Little by Little” mellowed into “Small Town”. Ramping up momentum, the bass-heavy barrage of “Imitation Leather Shoes” became the group’s last song of the second set as a six-piece band.
Pausing to allow the metamorphosis to unfold, JB welcomed Cosmic Country guitar-slinger Daniel Donato to the stage. This is not the first sit-in—the Nashville native had joined WSP twice prior, in Charleston in 2023 and during Panic en La Playa Doce in early 2024. Donato and Herring traded licks and smiles during “Holden Oversoul” and a powerful trio of covers: Bloodkin’s “Trashy”, Bukka White’s “Fixin’ To Die” (well-known via its association with Col. Bruce Hampton), and a scorching Funkadelic’s “Red Hot Mama” to close out the set.
During Thursday night’s encore, Widespread Panic double-dipped into Warren Zevon’s catalog for the band’s sixth performance of “Keep Me In Your Heart” before closing out the night with the international debauchery of “Lawyers, Guns, and Money”.
With after parties and chicanery all around Music City, the rowdy crowd spilled into the streets and scattered, their fun-loving energy and vampiric thirst for more music on full display for all bystanders to witness. Round 2 tonight. Double down, get down, downtown in Panic town.
Below, check out the full setlist from night one of Widespread Panic in Nashville and watch a couple of fan-shot videos of the sit-in via Michael Wilker. Widespread Panic returns to Ascend Amphitheater on Saturday and Sunday, April 25th and 26th. Find tickets to this weekend’s remaining shows and the band’s other upcoming tour dates here.
Widespread Panic w/ Daniel Donato – “Holden Oversoul” – 4/24/25
Widespread Panic w/ Daniel Donato – “Fixin’ to Die” (Bukka White) 4/24/25
Setlist [via PanicStream.com]: Widespread Panic | Ascend Amphitheater | Nashville, TN | 4/24/25
Set One: Send Your Mind, Coconut, Porch Song, Party At Your Mama’s House > Stop Breakin’ Down Blues, Surprise Valley > No Sugar Tonight / New Mother Nature > Surprise Valley, Conrad (58 mins)
Set Two: Big Wooly Mammoth > Jam > Hatfield, Little By Little, Small Town > Imitation Leather Shoes, Holden Oversoul [1], Trashy [1] > Fixin’ To Die [1] > Red Hot Mama [1] (90 mins)
Encore: Keep Me In Your Heart, Lawyers, Guns, and Money (8 mins)
Notes: [1] with Daniel Donato on guitar
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